WaSOP roundup

Delayed, I know. I thought I'd get round to it now.

Kick off Friday, 10am. Outside Milan's, where instead of a nice little 1.4 he's bagged a Rover 75. I guess the hire place has got to use them as much as possible before they go ping. Needless to say Rich is still in bed. One trip up to Hunters Bar later and we're under way. Stop at a services a bit after 11, get some overpriced Burger King and find a bookies. Not good. Shove a quid on trap 3 in the 11.26 at Wimbledon, jopke. Fails horribly. A bad omen? I guess so.

Get down there about 40 minutes before the 1pm fiver NLHE rebuy. FInd Dave, they're still setting up and not registering yet. Nip up to the (newly modified) Graduate for a round of Grolsch (as the decent beer needs a barrel change). Finish that and we're under way.

Table looks fairly harmless. There's Dhruv (2nd in UKSPC) and a load of Warwick guys, some guy from (I think) Manchester doing a combination of a Matusow and Arama impression, and an empty seat (later taken up by Brice). First hand, 9-6s in the small blind. Limps in about three places, I complete and the BB checks. Flop is 8-7-5 kerching. I lead out for about 150 (blinds 25/50), Dhruv pushes and someone else calls. I call (duh), Dhruv has 10-9 and the other guy has garbage, triple up first hand. I drop down to about 2700 when I get Q-10. It's unraised and the flop comes K-J-9. A fish bets, Dhruv goes all in (I have him covered), I push and the fish calls. Dhruv has K-10 for top pair and a straight draw, fish has Q-9 for bottom pair and the other gutshot draw. So they have a combined 4 outs, 8K chips here I come...

Turn = Q
River = 9
Fish = runner runner boat. Fuck.

Knocks me down to about 1K3, flop a straight with 6-4 but don't get called, end up after a top up with about 2K2. Build it up to about 4K with steals and uncalled all-ins before I take on this guy who's moved to our table who's raising all the time with A-4, reraising all in and he calls with 9-9. Bye bye. Still, it's only cost me a tenner and I'd make that move again.

Nip out for a bit to examine the newly formed pool and snooker room... jesus. It's a mess. Grab my cue (which I've missed since Derby and no bugger did my retip request) for a quick game of pool... put it back in the cupboard which is an error as I don't see anyone else from snooker all weekend and the cue is still there. Grab some airfare then nip back down. Malcolm Harwood's only there, and I'm a bit of a PLO fish so I decline the tenner second chance. Play a couple of comedy quid STT's before hanging around waiting for an affordable cash game (I'm not playing the 25 min .50/1 blind game if they have an average stack of eighty quid). One doesn't arise and I also decline the limit HORSE game that gets set up.

Right now I'm also running low on options for places to stay. Pretty much everyone is unavailable or not answering. I go to the Graduate with every intention of sleeping in L3 before Milan calls and says that his room in the Holiday Inn is a twin. Kerching, that'll do. Only it's not the Holiday Inn that was pointed out when we were going in. Which I walked about three miles to. Anyways, Milan drives to pick me up (with some comedy dual carriageway slip road reversing manoeuvres) and we're done for the night.

Day 2 and we've got the heads up game. We've enlisted Sanjay and some guy from Heriot Watt whose name I forget. I win my first one, going behind early but regaining the lead then playing aggressively, eventually winning as K-5 is no match for my K-Q. Team wins 3-2. Round 2 is painful. I'm in complete control when I move in over the top of my guy with 4-4. He stares me down for EVER. Asks me if I have pockets. Ponders for some more. Finally decides that risking the match on at the very best a coinflip with 3-3 is a good idea. He hits quads. Next hand I'm outchipped but pick up Q-Q. Limp-reraise is called. Flop is 9-6-5. All the money goes in and he shows 8-7. Ouch. We lose 3-2. Third game I push with K-K and a board of 7-6-6-9, he has K-6. We lose 3-2. Finally 6-4 outdraws on 10-4 on a 7-5-4 flop to give me the lead and I win a kicker battle with us both holding an ace to finish. But we lose 3-2 and are out. Annoying. The main Sheffield team didn't do much better, and (wisely, in retrospect) deciding to give the HORSE a miss, we head to Varsity for some nice food, before going to Milan's hotel for a bit of STT action. It was all going well, I'd cashed in it, Amir had won and Stevenage had failed, then my A-10 was outdrawn by Pete's A-4 and that was that. I go to their hotel (somewhere in Nuneaton, of all places - made somewhat funny by driving for a large part of the A46 without headlights) and abuse their floor.

I give the main event on the Sunday a miss - Adam lands fourth for about 400 quid, a few people missed about two or three tables out. Ben turned up for the comedy large cash game. Watched the Norwich game in the airport which was somewhat humourous. West Brom survived - how, I don't know, and after trying and failing to get Varsity food again (damn mixed hockey tournament), watching the final table and thinking that going for two Carlings in five minutes was a good idea, we head back. All in all, a pricey weekend :-)